Marvel released their March 2011 solicits today (check them out here, a little bit later than usual but in time to allow them to announce their new event Fear Itself on their own terms. Of course, careful eyes looking through it might have noticed a solicit that seems kind of … well, spoiler-y. It would appear that one of the solicits might have accidentally given away the ending of “3”, the current Fantastic Four arc by Hickman and Epting that promises the death of one of the members of Marvel’s First Family.
But does it actually spoil anything? Take a look at the solicit behind the cut and let us know what you think! As a note: SPECULATIVE SPOILERS BEHIND THE CUT. If you don’t want to think that maybe the end of “3” has been spoiled for you, don’t click behind the cut (or read the solicits, I guess).
Written by DAN SLOTT
Pencils by MARCOS MARTIN & Humberto Ramos
Cover by MARCOS MARTIN
A “THREE” TIE-IN!
Following up on the shocking ending to February’s issue of FANTASTIC FOUR, SPIDER-MAN visits the FF for a very private wake–just for family.
40 PGS./Rated A …$3.99
Huh.
Here’s the breakdown:
Everyone in the Multiversity Comics offices have been speculating who is going to die during the arc for quite some time now. It’s only natural. We’d been guessing it might be Franklin, but as Marvel keeps insisting that it’s someone in the actual team (especially in ads in comics out this week) it’s got us thinking. Now, when we see this solicit, our head become crunching a few noted facts:
First, we have to think about who can’t die in the story. Well, the Thing has been shown to be part of “Fear Itself,” and now that he’s a team member of the New Avengers I somehow don’t see him getting knocked off (especially when he’s died before). The Invisible Woman also probably won’t die considering that she “died” in Mark Millar’s recent run. So it’s down to Reed and Johnny. Reed “died” in battle with Doctor Doom against Hunger (they were actually thrown back in time)… but Johnny’s number still hasn’t come up.
Second, we look at the available information in the solicit. It’s a comic written by Dan Slott that features Spider-Man mourning 
a death of someone in the FF. Who is Spider-Man most connected to in the FF historically? Johnny Storm, the Human Torch. Why do I say “historically”? Because Johnny and Peter are Amazing Friends and they have a history of teaming up under the pen of Dan Slott. Don’t forget Amazing Spider-Man #590-591 as well, in which Johnny was so adamant and upset about the loss of memory as to who Spider-Man was, also written by Dan Slott.
Third, and much less incriminating but still interesting of note, is the information we gleaned at NYCC during our interview with Jonathan Hickman, in which he let loose a freudian slip mentioning the male denomination “he” when speaking of the upcoming death (although he did quickly back track and add that he didn’t mean that literally after our interviewer Josh mentioned that bit).
So why else would Dan Slott pen a “3” tie-in during his Big Time arc? And what about this promo from way back when? Am I the only here that thinks the only reason Dan Slott would write a tie-in to “3” is because he wants to give an issue to mourn the friendship of the two heroes?
I’m reminded of the time when Marvel released solicits for X-Men Origins: Nightcrawler as a “Second Coming Tie-In” before quickly removing that little note. For those that noticed, it kind of spoiled that Nightcrawler would die in X-Force during the event, and although the death was still generally surprising, we still accidentally saw it coming due to information Marvel put out. This could be another one of those cases.
So what do you think? Is Johnny’s time up?
